And Andy Makes Three
by ladybard327
Summary: When an accident brings little Andy back into Brennan & Booth's lives, how will that impact the partners? Will it be what finally helps bring them together for good?
1. Chapter 1

"Brennan." She said simply, answering her phone without looking at the caller id. She and Booth were on their way to Maryland to interview the husband of the woman she'd just identified as a murder victim and her mind was totally focused on the case. Why had someone killed this seemingly innocuous woman? An elementary school teacher who was seemingly well-respected and loved within her community, Laura Briggs was a woman with seemingly no enemies. So how did she end up in the landfill, the victim of a deep stab wound to the chest?

"Bren? Sweetie, you need to come back to the lab." Angela's voice reached out over the phone and Brennan felt her stomach clench in response to her friend's tone.

"Ange, what's wrong?"

"I don't know exactly. There's a woman from Child Services here who's demanding to see you but she won't give us any real information, not even Cam."

"Child Services? What would they want with me?" She asked. Just the name of the agency was enough to make her heart beat faster in fear and she couldn't keep that fear from showing in her voice. Booth being Booth immediately picked up on it and immediately pulled the SUV over to the side of the road and took her hand in support once they had stopped.

"Sweetie, I'm not sure but this woman is giving me the creeps. Something just isn't right and I really think you need to get back here."

"We're on our way to an interview Angela, we can't just…"

"Ange, we're heading back now," Booth interrupted loudly, calling out to the artist over the phone. Brennan gave him a look that was somehow equal parts exasperation and gratitude and he smiled at her in return. "We'll be back at the lab in an hour."

"Okay sweetie, I'll let Attilla-the-social-worker know. Tell Booth I said hello and thanks. Try not to worry too much until then, okay? We won't know what's going on until you get here and whatever it is Bren, we'll take care of it together. I promise."

"Thanks Ange. See you soon." She disconnected the call and tried to fill Booth in on what was going on with the limited information that she had.

The partners made it back to the Jeffersonian in record time and mostly in total silence. Brennan's mind had been frantically searching for some reason outside of her own past as a foster kid for child services to be looking for her. Her first thought had been that something had happened to Russ and Amy, but a quick call to her brother had allayed that fear. So what on earth was going on?

They walked into the lab hurriedly, with Booth's hand safely occupying its correct place on her lower back, and headed straight for Angela's office.

"Sweetie!" the woman exclaimed upon seeing them. "Thank goodness you're here, I don't know how much longer Cam could take playing nice-nice with Madame Sourpuss. Come on, let's find out what all this is about." The words were rushing out of her mouth as she grabbed them and practically dragged them into yet another office.

"Dr. Brennan, thank goodness you're back. This nice lady has been waiting to speak with you." Cam said when she saw them in the doorway. Brennan glanced at the rather nondescript middle aged woman currently residing on Cam's couch and had to internally smirk that this was the person that had upset everyone with her presence today. This was not a woman whose visage automatically signaled danger. No instead, everything about her practically screamed oatmeal cookies and cups of tea, she looked every inch the kindly grandmother.

"Dr. Brennan hello, I'm Maxine Ellis with the Department of Children's Services. Is there somewhere we can talk privately?"

"Ms. Ellis, trust me, whatever it is you have to say will be shared with all the people in this room before you've even left the building. We'refamily around here. You'd be saving me a lot of grief if you'd just say it to all of us." Brennan said wryly.

"Ah," the older woman laughed, "I see. I have an office like that myself. If you're sure?" She paused until Brennan nodded her assent. "Very well. Dr. Brennan, I'm so sorry to have to tell you this but there was an accident outside Huntsville, West Virginia last night and…"

"Oh my god, Andy?" Brennan gasped as she recognized the location of the accident.

"Andy 's fine, Dr. Brennan, he wasn't in the car at the time of the accident. Mr. and Mrs. Grant however were killed instantly."

"Oh no," Brennan said, tears coming to her eyes. She'd liked the couple and had done everything she could to help them out once they'd adopted Andy. They were so young, so in love, so happy to finally have the family they'd always dreamed of and the hope of their town returning to its former glory, to have them die now just seemed especially cruel. "That's awful."

While Brennan was lost in her thoughts about the unfortunate couple, Booth's mind was busy putting two and two together. "Ms. Ellis, what's going to happen to Andy?" He asked finally and Brennan's head immediately shot up.

"Dr. Brennan, that's actually why I'm here. Jim and Carol Grant named you as the guardian of Andy in the event anything happened to him. I need to know whether or not you're willing to take on that responsibility. If so, since you're already a registered foster parent who has taken care of him before, I can have him here by the end of the day. If not, I'll have to find some other placement for now—"

"I'll take him, of course." Brennan interrupted before the woman even had a chance to finish her sentence. "Andy's already lost two families, he doesn't need to be with strangers right now."

"Thank you Dr. Brennan, I'm glad to hear you say that. I agree, that little boy has seen too much tragedy in his short life, I think it would comfort him to be around someone familiar. There is only one thing that I need you to think about—do you want temporary or permanent custody of Andy? You don't have to have an answer right now of course, but I'd appreciate it if you could let me know once you decide so that I know what I have to do next."

"Of course." Brennan's heart was screaming at her to volunteer to take him permanently, but she knew this wasn't a decision she could be impulsive about—she needed to seriously consider what she was doing before she made that commitment.

"Well then Dr. Brennan, I'll go back to my office to get everything started and I'll bring Andy by this afternoon. Does 5 o'clock work for you?"

"That would be fine." And with that, the older woman nodded kindly at the members of the team and let herself out of the office. For what seemed like hours but was actually less than a minute, everyone stood rooted to their place with an obvious look of shock on each face.

"Bren, oh my god," Angela said, breaking the silence first and rushing to her friend. "Sweetie, you're going to be a mommy."


	2. Chapter 2

And Andy Makes Three, pt. 2

"Bones?" he called from the doorway to her office. After the social worker had left to arrange things, Bones had all but fled from the room to the safety of her own sanctuary. He'd hung back a little, wanting to give her some space since he knew how she needed to process things. But he couldn't go back to his office without at least checking in on her. "How are you doing?"

"Booth, am I doing the right thing?" She asked softly and his heart broke to hear the indecision in her voice. This was his Bones, the strongest, most capable, most incredible woman he'd ever known and yet when it came to things like this, she was so unsure of herself. _She doesn't give herself enough credit_, he thought to himself.

"Of course you are Bones. That little boy has already lost two families and been through more shit than a child should ever even have to know about, let alone experience. You care about Andy and the Grants trusted you to take care of him if something happened to them. You're not the type of person who could just ignore that kind of trust, or a little boy in need."

"But Booth, what Ange said, about me being a mother now—is she right?"

"I don't know Bones. I guess it depends on if you want to keep him permanently." He said honestly, moving to lean on her desk next to her.

"I don't know. My first instinct, when that woman first said what had happened, was to say yes I want him forever. I don't know how to be a mother and the only reason I did an okay job the last time he was around was because of you."

"Yeah, but Bones the point is that you got the hang of it after a while. And if you needed some help to get things done, well what parent doesn't? Nobody does it alone, even single parents. They rely on family and friends and day cares to help pick up the slack."

"Booth, I'm scared." She admitted quietly and looked up at him with her heart in her eyes. "I don't think I can do this. You and I both know I'm not good with people and yet now I'm going to taking on the raising of one. What if I screw this up?"

"Bones, you're getting ahead of yourself here. It's normal, when you're talking about raising a kid to start thinking in terms of down the road, but at this stage, you need to take things one day at a time. And you're not alone, we'll all help you with this. We're family, remember?"

Brennan smiled at him as he said this last bit and then took a deep breath before asking, "Booth, will you do this with me?"

"Of course Bones, I'm here for you, don't ever question it. But you know what? You're thinking too much."

"Oh really?" She asked with a small smile on her face and her eyebrow slightly raised.

"Yep. Trust me, this is one of those 'heart in overdrive, brain in neutral' moments. Right now, you don't need to worry about what kind of job you're going to do or what problems might arise, you need to simply focus all your attention on that little boy and what he needs right now to feel safe and secure. Because his life just got blown apart…again. And even if he's not old enough to understand what's happening, he's going to be feeling it and he's going to count on you to provide some sense of calm and stability to his world."

Brennan took a deep breath as she processed his words. He was right and she knew it. Right now, her fears were unimportant and needed to be pushed aside. She needed to focus on Andy and his needs. "You're right. What should I do first?"

"Well, lucky for you, I've already taken care of that—we've got the next couple of days off from work, but Cam promises to call you and use the video link if anything urgent comes up. And before you even think about objecting to taking time off, remember that Andy's going to need some time to adjust to all these changes. He needs time to bond with you again and get used to his new situation without being shuttled back and forth to daycare or whatever. It's just a few days Bones, both you and the Jeffersonian will survive."

Again he was right and again she was forced to admit it. Not that she like the whole scenario, but Andy did deserve a few days of undivided attention at least. "Wait, Booth, did you say 'we' have the next couple of days off?"

"Yep," he said with a smile. "Is that okay?"

Brennan just stared at him in response. How could one man be so generous? He knew that she was going to need help with all this and so he'd made arrangements to be there for her without her even having to ask. "Booth," she said shakily, gratitude shimmering in her eyes. "It's absolutely okay, better than okay. Thank you."

"No problem Bones. Now, finish up whatever you've got going on over there that won't be able to wait a couple of days and then we need to head out."

"Where to?"

"Shopping Bones, shopping. Babies need a lot of stuff and we've only got about 6 hours until our little guy gets here. We need to be ready."


	3. Chapter 3

And Andy Makes Three, pt 3

"How can such a tiny creature need all this stuff?" Brennan asked in disbelief as she and Booth entered the baby mega-store.

"Well, it's not like it's all here for one baby. It's just all the stuff that's available for babies. Some of its necessary, some of its not, but they have it all in one place so that parents can pick stuff for themselves." Booth said with a big smile as he pulled a cart out of the station. And despite her discomfort with the sheer size of this store, Brennan found herself responding with a smile of her own. He was excited to shop for Andy and his excitement was contagious.

"Okay, so where do we start?" She asked, needing to formulate a plan of attack.

"We should probably focus on the big essentials first—crib, bedding and car seat. Then we can just wander around the aisles and pick up the little things."

"I agree that we should start with the big things, just wandering around sounds too unfocused. We should have made a list before we came here to make sure we didn't miss anything."

Booth wanted this to be a fun experience for Bones and he knew her well enough to know that she wouldn't be able to enjoy the day until she could relax a bit. So he calmly pulled out the small notebook he used to take notes at crime scenes and handed it over to her. "List away, Bones."

She looked at him for a moment to see if he was making fun of her, but his face just showed his excitement, so she smiled her thanks. Opening the notebook and using the pen attached, she began to make a list of everything he'd already said she'd need. "Okay, besides the big things, what else do we need?"

"Well, how old is Andy now?" Booth asked in return, his eyebrows knitting together with disappointment when he realized he didn't know anymore.

"Eleven months."

He had to smile. Of course Bones would know. She saw herself as this empirical scientist who just wasn't warm and caring like other people, but it was really all just a sham. In reality, she was just trying to protect the soft and gooey center she had by creating this seemingly hard exterior. Andy brought out the soft side of her like nothing else he'd ever seen and even though he was incredibly sorry for the little guy's circumstances, he couldn't help thinking that this woman and this child were somehow meant to be together, to be a family. One he could only hope she'd allow him to be a part of.

"All right, so we'll need a high chair too and some baby food and bottles."

"Both? Wouldn't he be using one or the other?" She questioned him.

"Nah, at this stage he's probably eating baby food during the day and taking a bottle at night. At least that's how it worked with Parker."

"Oh." She said simply, then went back to her scribbling.

"And we'll need diapers and wipes and such. Plus some toys and clothes and pacifiers." He looked over to see his partner furiously scribbling down everything he was saying and the irony of it all made him burst out laughing.

"What?" She asked, pausing to look up at him with a scowl.

"Oh Bones, who would've ever thought we'd see the day where we switched places!"

"What are you talking about?"

"Look at us Bones, we're doing the exact opposite of what we do every day. This time, I'm the one rattling off important details while you're standing by taking notes! "

Brennan looked at him then looked down at the book in her hand and let out a small laugh. "Yeah, I guess I can see that. Except this time there's no decomposing body nearby… that we know of."

Booth laugh turned into a snort. "Bones, you just made a joke! Good job!"

"Don't look so shocked Booth, it has been known to happen from time to time. Now, let's get started on this list."


	4. Chapter 4

_**AUTHOR'S NOTE:**__** Okay guys, I've been slacking on this. I could list a dozen different reasons for it, but they really don't matter. Just know that I'm sorry for the delay and I'm trying to do better. Please keep reviewing and sending me little comments, they not only make my day but they help inspire me to write more (and faster). **__****_

And Andy Makes Three, pt. 4

Three hours and several thousand dollars later, an exhausted Brennan returned to the lab while Booth headed over to her apartment to await delivery of the larger items and start putting things together. She headed straight to her office, hoping to avoid a heart-to-heart with Angela at least for now. This whole situation had happened so fast, she felt like her world had been knocked off its axis. In a matter of hours, she was going to be responsible for a little boy. Whether it was a temporary or permanent situation, the fact remained that he was going to depend on her for everything and all she kept thinking was how he deserved so much better than she was going to be able to give him.

Sure financially and intellectually, she was as good a candidate for parenthood as anyone else in her age group. It was the emotional aspect she was worried about. She was well aware of her own limitations and deficiencies, but how would her inadequacies impact Andy's life? And without Booth there to drag her out of her office at reasonable hours, she had been known to work well into the night. What if she got so wrapped up in a case that she lost track of time and Andy felt neglected? These were all issues that she was going to have to deal with. And if she couldn't find satisfactory answers, there was no way that she'd be able to keep him.

"Hey sweetie, " Angela called softly from the doorway, noticing her friend's contemplative expression. "You guys get everything you need?"

"I would hope so considering the sheer amount of stuff that we loaded into the SUV," Brennan responded wryly. "Booth took it all back to the apartment to get things set up and wait for the deliveries."

"Wow, they're delivering stuff on the same day you ordered it? That's impressive."

"Not really, it just costs extra."

"So how excited is Agent Hot Stuff?" Angela asked, taking a seat on Brennan's couch with a smile.

Just remembering the expression on Booth's face as they went up and down the aisles in the baby store made her smile widely. "There aren't words to describe it Ange. He was a happier shopper today than you are when we shop for shoes."

"Wow, that's hardcore happy there, Bren."

"I know. He knew exactly what we'd need now versus later, what the best brands were, all that stuff that I would've had no clue about. I couldn't have done any of it without him."

"It would've gotten done, you just probably would've sent an intern to pick up stuff Bren. This way though, you got to have some fun. Did you get some cute outfits?" Part of Angela really wanted to call Brennan on the 'we' her friend kept dropping unconsciously, but she was afraid if she did, her friend would panic. She needed Booth to guide her way through this and to give her the confidence that she could keep doing this and keep the baby forever. And if the process just happened to help these two ridiculously stubborn people find their way to each other, who was she to complain?

"Of course that's what you think of first," Brennan laughed. "Yes, we got him some outfits, although I have to say I'm a bit concerned about the patterns they put on these clothes. Anything deemed 'boy' appropriate either had trucks on it, or bears, which in reality would eat the child, or sports. That much gender conditioning and stereotyping at such an early age is disturbing!"

"Bren, people are just trying to dress their baby cute and maybe help people know if it's a boy or a girl by the colors and patterns they wear. It has nothing to do with who the kids will grow up to be."

"Still, it seems a bit ridiculous."

"So after the bickering was over, what did you decide on?" Angela said with a smirk. She could just imagine the arguing back and forth over the inaccuracy of having bears on onesies or the macho overtones of dressing a baby in clothes adorned with large vehicles. She wished she'd thought of following along just to see them shop and listen to them talk.

"Dinosaurs." Brennan mumbled.

"Really?" Angela said, raising her eyebrows in surprise.

"Yes, it was the least restrictive of the choices. I mean, how could a little child be interested in trucks and he can't even feed himself yet, so sports seemed rather ridiculous…"

"And we know how you feel about bears."

"It's wholly inappropriate around children, Angela."

"Yeah, yeah, I hear you. But why dinosaurs?"

"Well Booth pointed out that since Andy was bound to be around the Jeffersonian, he would be around actual dinosaurs skeletons, something that most little boys wouldn't have the opportunity to do. And even though an actual dinosaur would have eaten a small child, there aren't any around now so its acceptable for them to be interested in the species from a purely scientific point of view."

"Oh, okay." Angela had to bite the inside of her mouth to keep from laughing out loud. Boy, Booth sure was smooth. He knew exactly which argument would be able to break through to her best friend.

"Dr. Brennan?" Maxine Ellis stood in the doorway to the office, drawing their attention to her and the little boy squirming in her arms. "I think someone's pretty excited to see you."

Without thinking, Brennan got out of her chair, crossed to the doorway and settled Andy onto her hip the moment he reached out to her. "Hey little man." She said softly, running a hand across his hair and settling a small kiss on his forehead. "You ready for me?"

Immediately upon being in Brennan's arms, Andy's squirming stopped. At the sound of her voice, looked up at her, mesmerized and reached up one hand to touch her face.


End file.
